Of Days and Ends

A/N: Hey everyone, I just wanted to let you know that I shall be typing the sex scenes from experience pretty soon. I have an older man of my own now... It's actually kinda casual, but now I know how it can be. This guy is twice my age and quite fit, so I'm excited to see how the little voice in my head uses these new experiences.
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Chapter 12--Awakening



It turned out that Hermione was completely correct. Veritaserum aged very, very badly and they found out when they revived her and placed a couple drops on her tongue. She had fought them, even without her wand and landed a few good scratches on Order faces. She had screamed hysterically about dates and moon cycles and poison and threats and no one listened. They needed answers more than to listen to her knowledge or her potential lies, and Hermione paid for it dearly.



Harry and Ron sat by her bedside on the seventh day while they waited for Hermione to wake up from her coma. Madame Pomfrey had been voted to be allowed to come tend to her, and the Order had learned better than to do a full member vote, so Snape was never informed. The mediwitch had informed them that Hermione would likely wake up during the tenth day quite ill, and would need to be given a Bezoar stone at that time.



When the time actually came, and Hermione woke up around noon, nobody had expected her to be as sick as she was. Her eyes fluttered open and she looked like she was going to be okay as she smiled at Harry and Ron, but a split second later, her face went completely white and her mouth began to foam. She leaned over the bed and her hair fell into her face. Harry raced across the room to grab the Bezoar stone while Ron scooped her foam-contaminated hair away from her face.



It took them five minutes and lots of gagging to get the Bezoar down her throat before the foam became a stream of slobber and stopped. Hermione breathed a heavy sigh of relief and breathed heavily as though she had just run a mile. Her eyes watered from the exertion and her throat burned from the rough stone scraping down her throat. This gave her a bit of time to get angry. She sat up, snatched her wand up, and drew breath to hex both boy’s bits off when a sudden sharp pain to her stomach made her gasp and drop her wand.



Madam Pomfrey had heard the sounds of the boys scuffling upstairs, and quickly ran up the stairs with McGonagall and Mrs. Weasley following close. Wrenching the door open and surveying the writhing girl on the bed, Madam Pomfrey grabbed both boys by their collars and threw them out of the room, stuffing the women out as well. Hermione snatched at Madame Pomfrey’s robes and began to hyperventilate. It wasn’t long until Madame Pomfrey stupefied her to spare her the pain while the Bezoar ran its course.



Hermione woke again the next morning and dressed to go back amongst the Order. As she was brushing her hair, she was surprised to see that the end third of her hair was a greyed colour where it fell in the foam she spewed during the previous day and she frowned at it, squinting to figure out what happened. Apparently the foam destroyed the colour in the ends of her hair. Her sheets and nightclothes had the same grey streaks of colourlessness. Eventually she decided to style her hair in a loose braid behind her back. She went downstairs to find Mrs. Weasley was sitting at the table with Kingsley, Harry, Ron, McGonagall, Lupin and Tonks. Her eyes widened at the matron who was usually bustling around everyone else until she noticed Madame Pomfrey coming from the kitchen with a massive plate of food. No one had noticed her until she reached the base of the stairs, and she was immediately caught in a massive welcome.



Madame Pomfrey smiled kindly at her and passed her a bowl of fruit when she managed to sit down again. “Good morning, Miss Granger.”



“Good morning.” Hermione forced a smile around at everyone and they all sat down again. “I’m surprised to see you sitting with us, Mrs. Weasley!”



“Well, Poppy is a very good cook, and I thought I might sit down and enjoy for a bit.”



“Actually, Fred put a sticking charm on her chair and she can’t get up.” George said from behind her, coming down the stairs with a purple substance all over his face. This seemed to make Mrs. Weasley smile smugly, so George said, “C’mon mum! We can’t really go to work like this, can we? Reverse the charm!”



“No.” she said firmly, “That will teach you a lesson.”



While George turned to stomp back up the stairs, Hermione addressed everyone softly, “How long have I been asleep?”



“Nearly two weeks.” Kingsley said quietly.



“Oh…” she looked down to her hands. She was boiling over with anger and used every ounce of her famous self-control to refrain from hexing everyone at the table. Instead, she grumbled, “Can’t say I didn’t tell you so.”



“We are deeply sorry, Miss Granger—” McGonagall began, but Hermione cut her off.



“You could have killed me! You could have put me in a persistent vegetative coma! You could have even broken my jaw when you were forcing that poison down my throat!”



“We needed answers and you were too much of a risk to the Order without them!” McGonagall snapped back.



The entire table turned their attention to Hermione again who seethed. Harry’s eyes were drawn to her right hand as it twitched as though aching to grab her wand, “You almost killed an innocent person, a person who has been no less than a phenomenal asset to the Order!”



“If you may say so yourself.” Mrs. Weasley mumbled, though nowhere near quiet enough for her to miss.



Hermione seethed.



“Hermione, would you answer some questions for us?” Kingsley interrupted, and, like a balloon, Hermione’s temper was immediately deflated. She was worried about what questions they would ask and how much she would have to lie. She ran a hand through her fringe and nodded. Snape’s voice permeated her thoughts as she remembered him say, “The best lies are based in fact.”



Kingsley looked around the table once before turning his attention back to her. “Where were you the night before the fight?”



She responded with the same lie as before, “Following Snape.” She reinforced it in her mind by remembering Snape leading her by the hand to the transfigured couch.



“Why did you leave the house in the first place?” He continued



“I was performing the next step in an experimental process I started.” She remembered Snape moving in her and had to focus on keeping her face carefully unreadable as she became aroused by the memory.



McGonagall leaned forward and asked the next question, “Why didn’t you tell someone you were leaving?”



“I didn’t want anyone to say I couldn’t go, and I had confidence that I wouldn’t be in danger if I remained vigilant.”



“You expect us to believe that you followed Snape and he didn’t hear you?” Moody questioned gruffly, and everyone nodded and murmured their agreement.



Hermione arched an eyebrow and just answered the question directly, “Yes, that is exactly what I expect you to believe.”



After nearly half an hour of questioning, the Order seemed to be losing steam and Hermione breathed a sigh of relief when Kingsley stood



“I think I speak for the lot of us when I say that we are satisfied for now with your answers, but we are by no means happy with them.” Hermione nodded and Kingsley continued, “Headmistress McGonagall and I have devised a way to make sure that the three of you are safe and plottable.”



“Speaking of plottable…” Mrs. Weasley began, “I have one more question.” Everyone’s attention snapped to Mrs. Weasley. The matron tried to get up, remembered that she couldn’t, blushed, and sent her swan patronus flying up the stairs. Seconds later, Fred and George apparated to her side, performed the spell to release her, and she took the purple off of their faces. Then, turning away from Hermione, she performed Hermione’s searching charm. Her wand led her around the table to Hermione. “Now that I know the charm works, do you care to tell us why I could not find you every time you went missing?”



Hermione froze. She knew why, but she couldn’t think of a plausible excuse that would support the rest of her lies, so she feigned ignorance and surprise, “What, if anything, happened?”



“It would point in a general direction, but would not lead.”



Hermione silently appreciated Mrs. Weasley’s stupidity. If the woman had any sense she would apparate to several spots until she found the centre, then narrow the fields until she found the location. It would become abundantly clear that Hermione was in a secret-kept building if she had done that and Hermione might have had to explain herself again.



Hermione tapped her wand on the surface before saying, “I can’t believe that there’s a flaw.”



Harry and Ron exchanged glances and stifled laughs. Hermione looked up at them, “What? What’s so funny?”



“Nothing.” They answered in unison. Harry continued, “It’s just nice to see that you have the ability to be wrong from time to time.”



Hermione couldn’t help but smile at that. She knew the spell was flawless.



Kingsley cleared his throat and started over, “As I was saying, the headmistress and I have devised a way to keep you three safe and plottable.”



Hermione listened warily as Kingsley told them about the charm necklaces they would each wear with a plotting and portkey function in the case that one of them were in danger. “This way,” Kingsley went on to explain, “you three can have a bit more freedom, and we can all be assured of your safety.”



The trio agreed and the Order disbanded leaving the trio alone in the house.



Hermione turned to Ron and Harry who looked at her anxiously. Ron broke the silence first, “Well?”



“Well, what?”



“Where did you learn to fight like that?”



“What do you mean?”



“I’ve only ever seen Dumbledore do a spell like the one you did. You stunned Tonks and Lupin with that one spell.”



“Well, I had read about it before and I was desperate, so I tried that one. How about you though?” she said in an effort to distract Harry, “You were awesome! I was worried when you came in, and your spells are so powerful!”



Harry blushed and changed the subject, “What are we going to do about those necklaces? We can’t let them track us. We’ll need to leave at the start of the next year.”



“I don’t understand. Why don’t we just maintain base here?” Hermione asked for the millionth time.



“I don’t think this house will be safe for long, Voldemort has been fairly silent for months and I am worried that he’s going to strike either here or with the Ministry. We have to have completely disappeared off the radar by then.”



“Let’s just accept the necklaces they give us and leave them somewhere that they can find them, and know we weren’t in danger.” Ron suggested, “No note, just positioned carefully.”



Hermione nodded, knowing they were correct, but worried about how often she’d be able to sneak away and visit Snape. Once she had thought of him, she rushed the conversation to an end and told the boys that she wanted to visit her parents. They nodded and she spent most of the evening packing for a week with her parents. She had already contacted them and received their return post via Hedwig. By the time she was ready to go to bed, Hermione noticed that she was beginning to get a tingling sensation in her neck and shoulders.



She rubbed her neck after letting her hair down for the night and ignored it. Within three hours it seemed to spread down her arms and was followed by a distinctly fearful feeling that something uncontrollable was going to happen, she knew that something was being transmitted to her from Severus. She quickly locked her bedroom door and placed a silence spell on the room, preparing for the worst.







The gathering had been easy and even with the elder Crabbe and Goyle by his side, ruining his best catches, he managed to kidnap five women and bring them back for Bellatrix to guard. The bitch had tried to poison him daily while on this trip, but he was no fool. If it came from Bellatrix’s hand, passed through Bellatrix’s hand, or was prone to Bellatrix’s influence he didn’t eat it. Additionally, he placed wards around his makeshift potion’s lab to keep her from tampering with his work.



When it came to poisoning Bellatrix, however, he was much more successful in his efforts and managed to poison her three times. The first time, he left a light dusting of McPherson Powder in her glasses in retaliation to the salamander fire she had set to his robes, leaving him with only the ones on his back. Her resulting paranoia and pulling of her hair, annoyed him immensely, but he was pleased by her anger when she awoke the next morning with clumps of hair scattered around the house. The second time, he put a hallucinogen in her shoes and retreated to the privacy of his room to laugh hysterically when she raced down the streets in the nude, crying for the dark lord to save her from the fairies. The third time, he filtered in some smoke from a potion that made her voice rise as though she had sucked from a helium balloon. Even Crabbe and Goyle were thrilled by this and guffawed throughout the packing of the kidnapped girls as Bellatrix fumed and resolved to remain silent.



“Is that everything?” Severus asked as he turned back to the other three death eaters. Bellatrix refused to answer, and Crabbe and Goyle looked to her expectantly. “What’s wrong, Bellatrix, Kneazle got your tongue?” Making a rude gesture, Bellatrix apparated them just outside of the gates of Spinner’s End. Severus marched the line of girls in, followed by Goyle and Crabbe. Bellatrix secured the fence and sulked behind them.



When they reached the sitting room where the Dark Lord was reclining on an actual throne of black with rich red cushions propping him high, they lined the wailing women up in front of him. Most of their clothes were torn from fighting to get away, but they were still fully clothed. Voldemort waved his wand and laughed cruelly when they began to cry in earnest over their sudden nakedness and the hideous man on the pillows in front of him. Inside, Snape’s chest felt familiarly tight over their emotions, but he remained composed and unreadable.



Rising from his chair and sweeping towards the girls, a hush fell in their crying until he reached for the redhead. She was a vibrant girl and Snape knew that she would be perfect for the Dark Lord, so he had acquired her as well. As his hand stroked her jaw line, a look of panic spread across her face and she screamed shrilly sparking a panic in the other four girls. Snape stunned her immediately and the rest of the girls fell silent immediately, and Voldemort turned to him and applauded his catch.



“Very, very good, Severus.” The spindly hands clasped around his wand and lowered on Severus rendering him naked, “You may have the second choice.”



Snape feigned a smile and bowed at his master’s feet, “If I may, my lord, I would like to watch today. It has been a while since I have done that, and I look forward to watching you work the little redhead.” It sounded terribly vulgar and crass, but it was the fastest lie he could think of. He didn’t want any of them anyway; he only wanted Hermione and did not want to betray her for any cause.



“No, Severus, this will likely be the last revel you will attend for quite some time. I have a post in mind for you, and you will likely remain very busy, so enjoy this one. I am very pleased with you, and insist on you accepting this last gift.”



The way he said it, Snape knew it was not a request, so he stepped up and jerked a tall black girl around by her neck. He had expected her to be the most spitfire of them all, but instead she looked up at him silently with pleading eyes. His gut clenched painfully and it took all of his resolve to do what he had to. He didn’t want to do it, but then, he never wanted to do it, and like always, Severus Snape did what was necessary to survive.



A/N: Firstly, scootergirl81, I feel honoured that you enjoy my fic that much, so, of course you can write a parody! I don’t mind in the least, and that goes for all of you. To that anonymous reader, I appreciate the homophone correction, and I have taken it to heart. I have too many things going on to go back to those chapters and correct it immediately, but I can assure you that it will be done soon. And now I’d like to say a special thank you to catysmom who is still in first, sslover who is solidly in second, Sampdoria in third, JunoMagic and Sureves Epans in fourth, and CB13, Perservero, and Slytherin-princess in fifth. I dearly appreciate you all! Also, dear nanoq, neko36, scootergirl81, Tristanshawk, PyroAngel, meankitty69, Tasha, the anonymous reader, and Megan… I love you all!



I hope you are still enjoying this, and I thank you all for being so supportive.